Quote of the Moment

Thursday, January 04, 2018

2018... What? Already?

Nothing like the end of a year and the beginning of the next sneaking up on you. I'd love to snap a picture of my 1-Year Plan written in my Bullet Journal for this post, but alas it hasn't made it into the Bullet Journal yet.

At least I have a 1-Year Plan, even if it's only in a Word doc right now. Guess what? I have a 5-Year Plan, too! That was pretty damned hard to do, though it's only drafting, revising, and publication goals.

Last year, I jumped into the year with too high expectations for my productivity. I can declare this, since I didn't hit all of my goals. But I'm still thrilled with the progress I did make. So this year, I'm going to be more realistic. I crunched numbers (numbers are fun), and my plan for this year follows how productive I was last year. Yay for realism? Hehe.

Before I get into a few items from my 1-Year Plan, just know, if you're patient, you'll discover which Tarot card won in my survey. You just have to read to the end for it. Oh, the suspense! ;)

I decided I needed a few mantras for 2018. Maybe if I repeat these every day, they'll sink in. And I think they say a lot about where I am in my writing career right now.

2018 Writing Mantras

❦ Slow Down.

❦ Just Write.

❦ Live.

❦ One Word At A Time.

❦ Any Progress Is Good Progress.

❦ All In Time.

Writing kind of took over my life last year, which is why the first one is, "Slow Down." I love to write and I have a writing career to build, but I don't want to sacrifice everything else in my life, including family time. In 2017, I felt like I was scrambling with writing all year and ignoring everything else too much.

With that said, my main writing goals for this year follow! (Note: This excludes any developmental editing and beta reading work -- I do have a limit of work hours per week scheduled for that as well, though.)

2018 Writing Goals

❦ 10 hours per week of writing and writing related tasks. (No more, no less -- though I have some scheduled weeks off.)

❦ Maximum 2 hours per week of critiquing.

❦ Complete revisions and do an edit of Thorns Entwine the Blade.

❦ Draft, revise, and edit the next Fortunes of Fate story. (What card will it be based on? Keep reading!)

❦ Start revisions on the poor, neglected novel, Dead As Dreams

❦ 1 newsletter per month -- each one will include a chapter of the first draft of Chains of Nect: Obsidian's Obsession in mobi and epub formats!

❦ 1 blog post every 2 weeks. (Yup, I'm reducing the blog post frequency again -- I may have a few extras, though, depending on how the year goes.)

That's the main stuff. Oh, you wanted to know about publications? Yes, yes. I still plan to release two titles in 2018, but right now I don't have publication dates. I don't want to stress myself out with firm deadlines. Progress is what's important.

2018 Publications

This post has gotten rather long already. So I won't go into my 5-Year Plan extensively, but I will mention some general details. Again, it mostly contains word count goals for drafting and revision along with hopeful publication dates. I expect it to change each year, as a plan like this is mainly just to see where I'm heading and isn't set in stone.

You already know the publication goals for 2018. So... 2019 -- Dead As Dreams and GSD vs. Everything. 2020 -- I'll be working on the draft and revisions of the third Trinity Torn novel for most of the year, so publications will hopefully be 1 Fate story and 1 other story connected to Trinity Torn. 2021 -- The third Trinity Torn novel, a Fractured Fairies story, and a Devil Made Me story. 2022 -- Downward Spiral, the first title in my Urban Unicorn novel series, 1 Fate story, and 1 collection of short stories (old and new).

5-Year Plans are scary, no? I think they are.

OK, I promised to reveal the Tarot card, didn't I? This post is huge! Maybe I should leave it for next time. You can wait two weeks, right?

Fine, fine. I'll be nice.

I had 2 votes each for:

❦ The Chariot
❦ Temperance
❦ The Empress

But there was a card I had 3 votes for. And that card is...

❦ The Hermit

So that's the next one I'll be doing! This will be interesting. Jasp, the protagonist of the last Fortunes of Fate story, was a bit hermit-like. Which means it will be fun to see what I can do to make this next story completely different. The options are plentiful, especially since I can pull from the upright and reversed meanings of the card.

Thank you to all who voted!

I hope everyone excels with their 2018 goals. I'd be happy to hear what anyone else has planned for the year, writing related or not!

About Me

Alexa Grave loves to tell stories, but sometimes her characters decide to tell the stories for her. When she's not being dragged around by her characters, she can be found blogging on anything she thinks may interest her readers. Humor is intended in many of her posts, but if you can't see it, please humor her! Oh, and she has an M.F.A. in Writing Popular Fiction.